The American Tech Giant introduced the iPhone 16 series with newer technology support. One of them is the Wi-Fi 7 compatibility. That said, users should get reliable and faster wireless connectivity speeds than the previous generation, which is not the case.
There are several complaints on social media platforms where users struggle to meet the 6GHz band frequency, even though they are connected to premium Wi-Fi services.
The average conclusion drawn from the reports is that the users are getting speeds similar to the last generation iPhone 15 Pro series (around 1.7 Gbps), which supports Wi-Fi 6E.
During the iPhone 16 launch, the company showed up to 5.8 Gbps (theoretically) with the help of Wi-Fi 7. However, this data doesn’t mean anything in the practical world, irrespective of the comparing standards.
For instance, the previous models with Wi-Fi 6E have a maximum download speed of 9.6 Gbps, while Wi-Fi 7 can likely provide you download data speeds of up to 46 Gbps. However, as discussed, the users are not reaching the connectivity speeds as expected.
Further escalating the problem, regional interference also comes into the picture. For instance, Europe supports a single 320MHz band, while the US supports three 320MHz bands. Irrespective of this, even if the complete band is available, the company’s limitation restricts it to the 160MHz band (which is 50% of the total value), lowering the performance.
Wi-Fi 7 Test on iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Plus
Les Numeriques conducted a test on the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Plus, and in his report, both the devices were merely crossing the 1.7 Gbps mark.
The company has restricted the new smartphones to 160MHz channel width instead of 320MHz, thereby limiting the speeds of Wi-Fi 7. The official diagnostic tool helped identify the limitation of the width frequency, which gives enough evidence that it is a channel cap.
The Wi-Fi 7 technology has its own potential compared to Wi-Fi 6E. Hence, the issue is quite disturbing and frustrating, forcing the users to speak out on the web platforms like Reddit.
They say there is a negligible difference between the iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 in speed despite the Wi-Fi 7 technology. The top-tier Wi-Fi service providers’ official team, on the contrary, has acknowledged the issue. They asked the users to provide details for further assistance.
This is a serious and concerning issue since users are unable to get the required outcome from the expected technology. The official support is silent about it, and there have been no talks about the problem wavering around the net. While we are unaware if it’s a software problem or hardware limitation, we hope the company addresses it sooner.
We expect Tech Giant to release a software update to unwrap Wi-Fi 7 capabilities if there is a software problem. We cannot say anything if it’s a hardware fault. Let’s hope the company responds to the significant connectivity limitations on the iPhone 16 Pro models.